Article 27 of the Italian Constitution states that the sentence of imprisonment has a precise function of inestimable social value: to support and accompany detainees in a process of re-education and rehabilitation that should enable them, after serving their sentence, to reintegrate socially and professionally in modern society. However society knows very little about this process, and a convict’s arduous path from condemnation to liberation is still conditioned by a vision of prison as a confined space simply used as punishment.
The film “Ombre della Sera” attempts to recount the difficult process of social reintegration, and it is the very inmates and ex-inmates of the Rome based prison of Rebibbia who re-inact their return home after so many years of separation, in particular from their sons and daughters.